Nearly two centuries and a half ago, Gervase Markham wrote a very useful and entertaining tract, entitled "The English Housewife, containing the inward and outward virtues which ought to be in a compleate woman. As her skill in physick, surgery, cookery, extraction of oyles, banquetting stuffe, ordering of great feasts, preserving of all sorts of wines, conceited secrets, distillations, perfumes, ordering of wooll, hempe, flax, making cloth, and dyeing; the knowledge of dayries, office of malting of oates, their excellent uses in a family, of brewing, baking, and all other things belonging to a household." By aid of a contemporary[47] we are enabled to present a curious portrait of the Housewife from this authentic source. It should first be mentioned that the profusion of provisions in the banquets of the time bordered upon the barbarous magnificence, compared to the elegant modes of preparing dishes in the present day, and called for dining-halls and kitchens of sufficient dimensions to avoid the terrible confusion that must otherwise have occurred. Hence, the superintendence of the household was a labour of great extent and responsibility. It was held that a woman had no right to enter the state of matrimony unless possessed of a good knowledge of Cookery: otherwise she could perform but half her vow: she might love and obey, but she could not cherish. To be perfect in this art she must know in which quarter of the moon to plant and gather all kinds of salads and herbs throughout the year; she must also be cleanly, have "a quick eye, a curious nose, a perfect taste, and a ready eare;" and be neither butter-fingered, sweet-toothed, nor faint-hearted: for if she were the first of these, she would let everything fall; if the second, she would consume that which she should increase; and if the third, she would lose time with too much niceness. For an ordinary feast with which any good man might entertain his friends, about sixteen dishes were considered a suitable supply for the first course. This included such substantial articles as a shield of brawn with mustard, a boiled capon, a piece of boiled beef, a chine of beef roasted, a neat's tongue roasted, a pig roasted, baked _chewets_ (minced chickens made into balls), a roasted goose, a roasted swan, a turkey, a haunch of venison, a venison pasty, a kid with a pudding in it, an olive-pie, a couple of capons, and custards. Besides these principal dishes, the housewife added as many salads, fricassees, _quelquechoses_, and _devised pastes_ as made thirty-two dishes, which were considered as many as it was polite to put upon the table for the first course. Then followed second and third courses, in which many of the dishes were for show only, but were so tastefully made as to contribute much to the beauty of the feast.